So I think I’m finally getting the hang of this ‘swirl in the pot’ soap swirling thing. I even managed to swirl 2 colors this time (this is where you ‘ohhh’ and ‘ahhh’). This soap was actually inspired by a crafty friend, Stephanie of Robot Pop. She has become one of my ‘testers’ and has given me several great ideas for new scents. This is one that she suggested to me, down to the swirl. I’m saving a bar for Stephanie for the great idea on this one – it smells fantastic!

I’ve been trying (unsuccessfully) to get a swirled soap that I think looks good for a while. Every time I do a test batch, something seems to go wrong and it doesn’t swirl. It either traces too quickly and is too thick to swirl, or doesn’t get quite thick enough and just blends together. I even made the mistake of trying to swirl a light color into a dark and the light just disappeared into the soap. Oops.

Well here it is folks – my first successful swirl. I like it – what do you think?

pine orange scented soap colored with Spirulina

This is a new soap I’m testing out that I may do for the holidays. It’s scented with pine and orange, and colored with Spirulina powder. When I first cut it, it was this beautiful bright green color. After curing for about 3 weeks, it’s faded quite a bit to a brownish green. I think the color works for a pine soap, but I’ll have to try something else for a true green.

Here are a few new soaps I’m testing out right now. I’m working on my fall and holiday scents, and have more ideas than I’ll be able to do, so only the best will make the cut. Let’s start with the soaps I don’t have pics of yet (either because I just haven’t taken them, or I’m not quite happy with how it’s looking so am not going to show you 🙂

Last week I made a spiced cider soap, with apple cider instead of water mixed with the lye, and orange, cinnamon and clove essential oils. I also added some brown sugar, which gave it a weird texture. Not sure I’ll keep the brown sugar, but it does smell really good.

Earlier this week I made my second batch of a chai tea soap. It has black tea as a base instead of water, half and half, honey, and an essential oil blend of cinnamon, cardamom, clove, ginger and black pepper. Smells pretty good to me.

And here are my 2 favs so far: triple mint and Mexican hot cocoa. I made these on the same day, and the smells mixed together and made the most heavenly mint chocolate smell ever. I’m already thinking of how to combine them.